Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

The Japanese were held in internment camps, they are different from concentration camps. In concentration camps people are held and killed in gas chambers or some other systematic method. The German Nazis used concentration camps during World War Two. Canada did not have any concentration camps during World War Two.

Is that sleep-making talk as empty as it seems? Could there be a reasonable message hidden in it?

What is multiculturalism? How has it failed? “Culture” in its widest sense means a way of life, language, food, family structure, government, economy, law, education, religions and political expression.

Culture means all “learned, shared and patterned behaviour.” You can’t put the whole bundle on display.

So multicultural festivals offer a token show of ethnic food and folk-dancing.

Artists and their fans and media allies cloud the foggy political arena even further, by using “culture” to mean “arts and scholarship.” Couldn’t we steal a word from another language to sort out the two meanings, and improve the visibility?

Partisan politicians — despite their slogans that smell more like anti-immigrant vote-canvassing than serious attempts to build policy — must know they are wrong when they say varied lifestyles can not co-exist. Alternative lifestyles do prosper, in Canada and other countries.

Hutterites are an example. Their communal, team-enterprise farm settlements, driven by shared religious faith, proved so economically successful that they frightened non-Hutterites into enacting laws to block what the outsiders saw as the threat of increasing Hutterite numbers and land takeovers.

The restrictive rules were later cancelled. But now the fear of Islam has replaced last century’s anxiety about such organized social dropouts as the Hutterites. But a commonsense answer to “multiculturalism is dead” advocates seems possible.

Old-timers from Duncan may remember the school at the foot of Hospital Hill where Japanese-Canadian kids gathered after hours to learn and conserve Japanese language and traditions.

That organized cherishing by expatriates of their former homeland may throw light on our “multicultural” puzzle.

Japanese society back then was the reverse of multicultural. It still is politely and firmly Japanese. Before the war, according to my sketchy knowledge, there were three minorities: an outlying group who spoke a variant of the Japanese language, a socially depressed underclass whose ancestors had engaged in “polluting” occupations, and the indigenous Ainu people, who were being pushed into more and more remote locations.

Add a few foreign workers, and you have the uniform Japanese model of an industrial society — night-and-day different from the many-stranded Euro-American version.

I doubt that many people cared about those facts when they heard about Duncan’s Japanese school.

They might have worried if they had given thought to Japan’s rigidly unequal society and its old military tradition, which licensed a samurai to strike a social inferior with his sword if the lower-status person insulted his honour.

But the group of Japanese expatriates in B.C. did not follow the cultural pattern of the homeland, except in one respect. They were scrupulously law-abiding, hard working, thrifty, ingenious and loyal to extended family.

They built a big stake in farming and fishing — which was sold at giveaway prices when Japanese-Canadians were pushed into wartime concentration camps.

The principle that jumps out of the Japanese-Canadian experience is that cultural systems are living, changing things. They adapt to circumstances.

And Islamic culture can also change as Muslim newcomers feel out their place in Canada. The threats that “multiculturalism-is-dead” people see in Muslim immigration may be imaginary.

But maybe we can’t take that adaptive change on faith. Maybe we should launch a deep inquiry into immigration policy, starting now.

gemort@pacificcoast.net(external - login to view)

—G.E. Mortimore is a Langford-based writer. Think About It runs every second week in the Gazette.

petros

+3

#2

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Sep 30th, 2011

A disgusting part of Canadian history....

mentalfloss

+1

#3

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Sep 30th, 2011

Now they have Internet camps.

petros

+1

#4

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Sep 30th, 2011

Tony Clement's son at camp.

mentalfloss

#5

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Sep 30th, 2011

dumpthemonarchy

+1

#6

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Oct 3rd, 2011

Not a good part of Canadian history, and we don't want it repeated, but the 20th century was a harsh time. There is no need for Canada to constantly apologise.

taxslave

#7

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Oct 3rd, 2011

You may call them internment camps. However when you forcibly remove someone from their home, move them several hundred miles and have armed guards keep them in, steal their assets and sell them there is not a lot of difference. Did I mention that many of these were second and third generation Canadians ?

dumpthemonarchy

#8

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Oct 3rd, 2011

If you read William V Shannon's book, Irish in America, on the first pages it states a fifth generation Irishman was not considered Irish by mainstream America. And this is a white man.

The Japanese didn't get due process of law, nor proper restitution, but they were not killed like Jews were. There were no ovens for Japanese in Canada in the internment camps. They were interned, imprisoned, not gassed. Big big difference

The Old Medic

+4

#9 Top Rated Post

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Oct 4th, 2011

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

The very term "Concentration Camps" and the concept, was invented by the British during the Boer War in South Africa. The Brit's rounded up whole populations of Boer women, children and men, and forced them into Concentration Camps (so called because they concentrated the people into a tiny area). Tens of thousands of those people died of disease, starvation, etc.

Concentration Camps in Germany were not the same things as the Extermination Camps at all. Read some history, and educate yourself. there was a HUGE difference between camps like Dacchau, and a Camp like Birkenau.

Canada (and the US) both placed many thousands of people of Japanese ancestry into CONCENTRATION CAMPS, and to a lessor degree they also put people of German,and Italian ancestry into the same kinds of camps. Many of those people were born in Canada, and were Canadian citizens, but they were locked up anyway because of their appearance and because of sheer racism. Just as many Americans of Japanese ancestry were locked up in camps, merely because of their appearance, and because of unmitigated racism.

In Canada, regardless of where they lived, all persons of Japanese ancestry were subject to being placed in Camps. In the USA, only those that lived in Western States were automatically placed into camps, those in the middle and Eastern states were not relocated at all.

For some reason, the Canadians also put thousands of people of Ukrainian ancestry into camps too. I have yet to read a compelling reason why that was done, but it was.

wulfie68

#10

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Oct 4th, 2011

Quote: Originally Posted by The Old Medic

For some reason, the Canadians also put thousands of people of Ukrainian ancestry into camps too. I have yet to read a compelling reason why that was done, but it was.

I've heard all about the Japanese internments and the German ones (although they were to a much lesser degree), but I haven't heard of this at all... and there are a TON of Ukranians in northern Alberta. The only Ukranian forced-migration/purge/(and I hesitate to use the word because it gets over-used) genocide was in the USSR in the 1930s when Stalin did it and starved his own subjects (I won't call them his own people because Stalin was Georgian, not Ukranian) in his push to move people onto his collectivized projects and away from their traditional farms and villages. Although the Canadian gov't was not adverse to taking fairly extreme measures against various ethnicities, as international politics may have pushed, I can't see any reason they would have had to move against the Ukranians...

WLDB

-1

#11

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Oct 4th, 2011

Quote: Originally Posted by wulfie68

I've heard all about the Japanese internments and the German ones (although they were to a much lesser degree), but I haven't heard of this at all... and there are a TON of Ukranians in northern Alberta. The only Ukranian forced-migration/purge/(and I hesitate to use the word because it gets over-used) genocide was in the USSR in the 1930s when Stalin did it and starved his own subjects (I won't call them his own people because Stalin was Georgian, not Ukranian) in his push to move people onto his collectivized projects and away from their traditional farms and villages. Although the Canadian gov't was not adverse to taking fairly extreme measures against various ethnicities, as international politics may have pushed, I can't see any reason they would have had to move against the Ukranians...

Neither can I. Nor do I see a reason for them to imprison Canadian citizens of German, Japanese and Italian ancestry, but they did.

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Remaining WWI veterans finally receive the right to vote and become the only Japanese Canadians to be enfranchised.

1936

Japanese Canadian Citizens League is formed and sends a delegation to Ottawa to petition for the franchise. The petition is unsuccessful.

1938

The New Canadian is established as the first English-language Japanese Canadian newspaper. It becomes the only Japanese Canadian newspaper allowed to publish during the years of uprooting.

1938-40

RCMP kept surveillance on the Japanese community. However, they recorded no subversive activity.

1939

Canada declares war with Germany. World War II and the War Measures Act

1941 Jan. 7

A Special Committee of the Cabinet War Committee recommends that Japanese Canadians not be allowed to volunteer for the armed services on the grounds that there is strong public opinion against them.

Mar. to Aug.

Compulsory registration of all Japanese Canadians over 16 years is carried out by the RCMP.

Dec. 7

Japan attacks Pearl Harbor. Canada declares war on Japan. Under the War Measures Act, Order in Council P.C. 9591, all Japanese nationals and those naturalized after 1922 are required to register with the Registrar of Enemy Aliens.

Dec. 8

1,200 fishing boats are impounded and put under the control of the Japanese Fishing Vessel Disposal Committee. Japanese language newspapers and schools closed. Insurance policies are cancelled.

Dec. 16

P.C. 9760 is passed requiring mandatory registration of all persons of Japanese origin, regardless of citizenship, with Registrar of Enemy Aliens.

1942 Jan. 16

P.C. 365 designated an area 100 miles inland from the west coast as a "protected area".

Feb.7

All male "enemy aliens" between the ages of 18-45 are forced to leave the protected coastal area before April 1. Most are sent to work on road camps in the Rockies. Some are sent to Angler.

Feb. 24

P.C. 1486 empowers the Minister of Justice to control the movements of all persons of Japanese origin in the protected area.

Feb. 26

Notice is issued by the Minister of Justice ordering all persons of "the Japanese race" to leave the coast. Cars, cameras and radios confiscated. Dusk-to-dawn curfew is imposed.

Mar. 4

B.C. Security Commission is established to plan, supervise and direct the expulsion of Japanese Canadians.
P.C. 1665 Property and belongings are entrusted to the Custodian of Enemy Alien Property as a "protective measure only".

Mar. 16

First arrival at Vancouver's Hastings Park holding center. All Japanese Canadian mail is censored from this date.

Mar. 25

B.C. Security Commission initiates a program of assigning men to road camps and women and children to ghost town detention camps.

June 29

P.C. 5523 - The Director of Soldier Settlement is given authority to purchase or lease farms owned by Japanese Canadians. He subsequently buys 572 farms without consulting the owners.

Oct.

22,000 persons of whom 75% are Canadian citizens (60% Canadian born, 15% naturalized) have been uprooted forcibly from the coast.

1943 Jan. 23

Order in Council grants the Custodian of Enemy Alien Property the right to dispose of Japanese Canadian properties in his care without the owners' consent.

1944 Aug. 4

Prime Minister King states it is desirable that Japanese Canadians are dispersed across Canada.
Applications for "voluntary repatriation" to Japan are sought by the Canadian government. Those who do not must move east of the Rockies to prove their loyalty to Canada. "Repatriation" for many means exile to a country they have never seen before.

1945 Jan.

150 second generation Japanese Canadians (nisei) are accepted into the Canadian Intelligence Corps after pressure from the British government.

Sept. 2

Japan surrenders. Atom bomb is dropped on Hiroshima.
All internment camps, except New Denver are ordered closed and settlements of shacks bulldozed. B.C. Security Commission office in New Denver closes in 1957. The Post-World War II Years

1946 Jan. 1

On expiry of the War Measures Act, the National Emergency Transitional Powers Act is used to keep the measures against Japanese Canadians in place.

May 31

Boats begin carrying exiled Japanese Canadians to Japan.

Dec.

The Privy Council upholds a Supreme Court Decision that the deportation orders are legal.

1947 Jan. 24

Deportation orders are cancelled. 4,000 Japanese Canadians have already been "repatriated".

Apr.

The Citizenship Act extends the franchise to Canadians of Chinese and South Asian origin, but excludes Japanese Canadians and aboriginal peoples.

July.18

The Bird Commission is formed to inquire into losses though sales by the Custodian at less than market value and through theft of property in the case of the Custodian.

1949 Mar. 31

Restrictions imposed under the War Measures Act are lifted and franchise is given to Japanese Canadians.

1950

Bird Commission findings awarded about $1.2 million and rejects the National Japanese Canadian Citizens Association appeal that further claims be considered as well as an indemnity for general losses.
Order-in-Council P.C. 4364 revokes an order prohibiting immigration of "enemy aliens", and provides for some of those deported to re-immigrate to Canada.
www.japanesecanadianhistory.n...e_timeline.htm (external - login to view)

Many mostly white Canadians profited at the expense of Japanese residents (could not be citizens even if born in Canada). They lost their homes and property, unlike German Canadian citizens.

Nuggler

+1

#13

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Oct 4th, 2011

Well, sheeee - it!! I always thought they was quiet places where ya could go to concentrate. gotta get out more. read more.

But, just to play the devil's advocate (and it WAS WRONG to take their property and not pay them for it or give it back after the war) - fact remains we were at war.

Anyone heard of Pearl Harbour, Baatan death march, rape of Nanking??

We have a friend who spent his formative years in a Japanese prison camp along with his family. Now that was "concentrated" They had their "internment" camps also. People were shot, tortured, hung,starved.............you name it. Some internment.

There COULD have been some Japanese spies in amongst the bunch in Canada, and they could have done some damage, directed bombing runs, torpedo runs, etc...................Just sayin. I don't know from war. Never been in one.

Piss on apologizing, it was wartime. Had I lived back then, I probably would have been, given the Japanese record for atrocities, in favour of internment camps, or concentration camps, whatever they were called.

Semantics

CDNBear

+2

#14

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Oct 4th, 2011

When did Japan apologize for their actions in Hong Kong? Or Unit 731 in Harbin?

Goober

#15

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Oct 4th, 2011

Quote: Originally Posted by CDNBear

When did Japan apologize for their actions in Hong Kong? Or Unit 731 in Harbin?

No comparison - We as they say admitted it was wrong and apologized - I see no problem with that - What I see a problem with is how long it took. Same with the residential schools.

The Japanese have yet to as a society meet up and see what was done, they like other countries are still in denial of reality.

Austria for 1 is only recently coming to terms with what they as a society did in the War, same with the French.

Cliffy

#16

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Oct 4th, 2011

I believe it was during WW1 when Ukrainian Canadians were interred in concentration camps. One f those was at Wedgwood, BC not far from here. A ceremony to commemorate the event took place there within the last decade and a plaque erected on the site. A friend of mine of Ukrainian descent attended. Seems these camps were more of a forced labour type. I'm sure Google will have something more to say about that.

gerryh

#17

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Oct 4th, 2011

Quote: Originally Posted by Nuggler

Well, sheeee - it!! I always thought they was quiet places where ya could go to concentrate. gotta get out more. read more.

But, just to play the devil's advocate (and it WAS WRONG to take their property and not pay them for it or give it back after the war) - fact remains we were at war.

Anyone heard of Pearl Harbour, Baatan death march, rape of Nanking??

We have a friend who spent his formative years in a Japanese prison camp along with his family. Now that was "concentrated" They had their "internment" camps also. People were shot, tortured, hung,starved.............you name it. Some internment.

There COULD have been some Japanese spies in amongst the bunch in Canada, and they could have done some damage, directed bombing runs, torpedo runs, etc...................Just sayin. I don't know from war. Never been in one.

Piss on apologizing, it was wartime. Had I lived back then, I probably would have been, given the Japanese record for atrocities, in favour of internment camps, or concentration camps, whatever they were called.

Semantics

Quote: Originally Posted by CDNBear

When did Japan apologize for their actions in Hong Kong? Or Unit 731 in Harbin?

There ya go, if the enemy does horrid things without remorse, then that means it's ok for us to do horrid things without remorse too. So there.

Goober

#18

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Oct 4th, 2011

Quote: Originally Posted by Cliffy

I believe it was during WW1 when Ukrainian Canadians were interred in concentration camps. One f those was at Wedgwood, BC not far from here. A ceremony to commemorate the event took place there within the last decade and a plaque erected on the site. A friend of mine of Ukrainian descent attended. Seems these camps were more of a forced labour type. I'm sure Google will have something more to say about that.

There ya go, if the enemy does horrid things without remorse, then that means it's ok for us to do horrid things without remorse too. So there.

Not what was stated - Read it again. More along a valid question asked.

dumpthemonarchy

#19

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Oct 4th, 2011

Punch in concentration camp definition in google and you get the following definition on page 1 from dictionary.com. This writer is trying to put Canada on the level of Nazi Germany and I reject that. The writer of this article should have offered more explanation. For some of us, concentration camps are connected to extermination camps and death camps and that means systematic murder.

con·cen·tra·tion camp

Noun: A place where large numbers of political prisoners or members of persecuted minorities are imprisoned, esp. in Nazi Germany and occupied Europe in 1933–45

-----------

dictionary.com has a more benign definition of internment camp:

internment camp

noun
a prison camp for theconfinement of enemy aliens, prisoners of war, political prisoners, etc

Goober

#20

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Oct 4th, 2011

Quote: Originally Posted by dumpthemonarchy

Punch in concentration camp definition in google and you get the following definition on page 1 from dictionary.com. This writer is trying to put Canada on the level of Nazi Germany and I reject that. The writer of this article should have offered more explanation. For some of us, concentration camps are connected to extermination camps and death camps and that means systematic murder.

con·cen·tra·tion camp

Noun: A place where large numbers of political prisoners or members of persecuted minorities are imprisoned, esp. in Nazi Germany and occupied Europe in 1933–45

-----------

dictionary.com has a more benign definition of internment camp:

internment camp

noun
a prison camp for theconfinement of enemy aliens, prisoners of war, political prisoners, etc

concentration camp
noun
a guarded compound for the detention or imprisonment of aliens, members of ethnic minorities, political opponents, etc., especially any of the camps established by the Nazis prior to and during World War II for the confinement and persecution of prisoners.

Origin: 1900–05, applied orig. to camps where noncombatants were placed during the Boer War

dumpthemonarchy

#21

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Oct 4th, 2011

Again, this writer erred. He did not use the more popular meaning. I smell an agenda here.

JLM

#22

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Oct 4th, 2011

Quote: Originally Posted by dumpthemonarchy

Not a good part of Canadian history, and we don't want it repeated, but the 20th century was a harsh time. There is no need for Canada to constantly apologise.

Yeah, it's a case of many being punished for the deeds of a few. Mind you what they did at Pearl Harbour kind of leaves a bad taste in your mouth. War is never just.

Goober

#23

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Oct 4th, 2011

Quote: Originally Posted by dumpthemonarchy

Again, this writer erred. He did not use the more popular meaning. I smell an agenda here.

Look at how they were treated - read the history -

dumpthemonarchy

#24

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Oct 4th, 2011

Quote: Originally Posted by Goober

Look at how they were treated - read the history -

Do you mean how the Japanese were treated? The Japanese were never treated as badly in Canada as Jews were in Nazi Germany, there is no compariosn. Jews were KILLED.

Goober

#25

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Oct 4th, 2011

Quote: Originally Posted by dumpthemonarchy

Do you mean how the Japanese were treated?

Japanese, Ukrainians, and others.

taxslave

#26

Re: Canada Had Internment Camps, Not Concentration Camps During WW2

Oct 4th, 2011

Quote: Originally Posted by wulfie68

I've heard all about the Japanese internments and the German ones (although they were to a much lesser degree), but I haven't heard of this at all... and there are a TON of Ukranians in northern Alberta. The only Ukranian forced-migration/purge/(and I hesitate to use the word because it gets over-used) genocide was in the USSR in the 1930s when Stalin did it and starved his own subjects (I won't call them his own people because Stalin was Georgian, not Ukranian) in his push to move people onto his collectivized projects and away from their traditional farms and villages. Although the Canadian gov't was not adverse to taking fairly extreme measures against various ethnicities, as international politics may have pushed, I can't see any reason they would have had to move against the Ukranians...

There is your answer. How much worse than Northern Alberta in the 30s and 40s can it get?